There's the dream trip, in that maybe we're dreaming right now and who's to say we're not, and then there's the acting trip. That we're always acting. So first things first, dream wise. I dream myself into scenes, sometimes, and then when I'm aware, all of a sudden, I notice we're all acting, in roles like, and I've got to know who these people are.

Who are you!? That's the first thing I ask as soon as I wake up in a dream and realize what's going on. And that confuses 'em good. But then, if it was a real world, the real world, it would confuse 'em good, too, right? Like if someone just rambled up to me out of the blue while I'm grocery shopping or dog walking and goes piping up all dramatic like: Who are you!?

Well, what am I liable to answer? Probably Eric, first. But then after, if they keep demanding, maybe it gets complicated. Maybe I say Madambe, or however you spell that African name of my childhood, because maybe as this lunatic keeps demanding, I'm starting to feel at a bit of a loss. Who am I, indeed?

Let's see. Eric, for one. Then, sure, Madambe. Then Mogley, maybe, because back in the service some people called me that. Then maybe Toupin, as I'm known to some friends and family alike. Or maybe an on-the-fly role designation, like: I'm just some guy grocery shopping, dude.

And you can imagine if it wasn't me being hounded but some other random nut-job puttering about in the grocery-lanes, that maybe they've got a bunch of names to go by, too. Like maybe an alias from gaming or online communities, maybe a raver name, something ludicrous like ninjakitten.

And as you keep shucking through the names, you're not digging deeper into yourself, no, you're digging laterally. Through roles. Handfuls of roles and no closer to whatever it is that's underneath -- if in fact there is anything down there. Through roles that might connect, somehow, might click with a little blistering thought of AH HAH! with this raving lunatic pestering you while you're tomato shopping. Where do I know this asshole from? What does he know me as? Who am I to him? Isn't that the real question? Who are you to them?

That's why, maybe, General Louis, then Nora, then Sahki the Ghost is not really so crazy an answer set. So we're acting out a play together and then WHAM I stop acting and put on real serious like and demand to know who you are. And maybe your first response is General Louis, as in, this role in this play we're in. Then I insist and so it's your real name or something, Nora. What you mean like for real? Outside of this play? Nora? What!? More insisting? Well then comes Sahki the Ghost from god-knows-what frame of reference. Because she's just digging, digging not down but from side to side, digging for who she is to me.

The point is that they're all roles. And of course, not each role has a unique name like Eric or General Louis or Nora. Whole arrays of roles share names with no real rhyme or reason.

So back to dreams, real quick. They seem more and more day-to-day as I pay more attention. Or, as I notice how sometimes I don't pay attention. Like, say, I'm walking Charlie the dog, just strolling down the walk and some guy is approaching me all normal-guy-on-the-street like. And he passes me and I never really look him in the face and I remember... what? That he's black. Had kind of a thug tempo about him, a little nervous about the dog maybe - not consciously even, but under the skin - and then, now remember -- this happened in real life.. And then...

It's like WHOAH that guy was just like someone out of a dream! Those shady secondary roles, those faceless nobodies, those hazy non-player-characters that just kind of skulk up and away in the sidelines with nothing but shifty archetypal features to slap onto their memory. Oh he was black, thuggy. Stand-offish a little. Really!? Is that all you've got!?

Is it really so surprising that there are so many hazy figures dabbering about when I'm dreaming, then? Waking life is cram-packed to the gills full of 'em, and me just never caring an ounce to notice. And if I suddenly stared the guy in his face and demanded, WHO ARE YOU!? Well, then what? You see, it follows that in dreams, too, people are taken back like.

Like on another dog walk when Charlie is pooping in someone's lawn - for the second time in a quarter hour - and I'm kind of stooping down awkward with a bag so that a cool .25 mm separates my skin from his feces. And I'm scooping it up in messy plops and there's this guy, looking side-street downtown blank-faced nobody, who's meandering towards me with arms full of grocery bags. And he walks right up near me, now, while I'm poop handling in a squat, and he unloads his groceries on this broken-assed dilapidated shopping cart and then starts pushing, shoving the thing like a horse's carcass down the sidewalk right next to me. And Charlie's in the sidewalk in this guy's way and I'm still shaking hands with feces, and I kind of say a "Sorry man," indicating that I'm in his way and whatnot and he just gurgles a dead-manned response and keeps on shoving.

And now see? If I start demanding who he is!? Who is he really!? What am I going to get out of the encounter? Not a whole god-dammed lot. Who does he look like? Some tanked up, spaced out junkster shoveling his beer groceries towards some alley where he can fade out for a little while. There's probably not a whole lot magical or out-of-place or conspiratorial or damned enlightening about this guy. He's just this guy, see. And what's worse is if you start demanding! Then he's not even a guy, he's just a role! This flat, brittle, two dimensional role giving you his schtick -- whatever it is that he says -- his schtick, his role to get you off his back, out of his life, away from his business -- and get him closer to that sleazy alley where he can take a load off just for a fuckin' minute. Do you see about the roles?

The roles thing is big, let me tell you. You see there's the whole trip about what's a dream? Are we in a dream? What's the difference between the real world and dreams, really? Well, in all my dreams of late one thing I constantly notice is, when I'm suddenly in possession of the awareness, I'm like WHOAH, is this some kind of a PLAY we're all ACTING in!?

And then I stop acting and like a cold fish start demanding who people are. Well, well, well. The identity thing, though, like mentioned in a paragraph previous, is not some kind of digging deeper and deeper, Oh no, no no. It's just lateral shifts.

So here's a scene from waking life: I'm at the bookstore with a friend and we go our separate ways and then I pile up a stack of books to buy in my arms as I go a-browsing and whatnot. Well she sees I'm all queued up to buy books, and acting on a passing remark I'd made about always buying too many books when I go to a bookstore, she gets it in her mind to take the books from me and not let me buy them. Protect me from myself in a kind of cutesy fashion. And so I'm sort of chasing her, now, in real life, around a bookstore.

Well that's all fine, so I'm kind of walking around, apprehensively following her, feeling a little ridiculous, trying with some seriousness to get the books back. You see she's playing a game, maybe, at first, but I really want to buy those damned things, and so suddenly I'm kind of a-walking after her, grabbing her arm now and again, nervy and uncomfortable and flirty like, a little, and then PRESTO: we're actors in a play.

And then there's later on, when she's asking me to go to this reggae concert and at first it's like no, because I don't want to be around a bunch of drunk people. But then, it's like well I kind of want to go but I've already made this decision to stick with this role: that principled guy who can't be swayed by a bunch of buttering up and please, please go with me, as a favor we'll have a lot of fun together, please. You see I've chosen the role now, this is the one I'm playing for this scene, and so when part of me wants to go maybe a little bit it's like NO! You've already selected a role! You've made your bed now lie in it!

Now see if my awareness walked in on a scene like this without any briefing beforehand, without an inkling of context, it (I) might be like: What the hell is going on here!? I'm in a bookstore but some girl won't let me buy the damned books I want so I am kind of grabbing her and she is saying things -- jokingly -- like This man is harassing me! Please leave me alone sir!

Or if it (I) walked in on this scene: In a car with this pretty girl that likes me and who is trying to convince me -- unsuccessfully -- to do something that, wait, wait for it, something that I actually do want to do! WHAT!?

And do you see!? It's a god-dammed play we're in and so -- again, imagining I waltz in on the scene unprivy like -- I might be like WHAT IS GOING ON HERE!? What is this damned ridiculous thing about books we're carrying on about!? I think I want to go to this god-dammed concert! What am I being so obstinate for!? Is this some sort of ROLE I'm playing!?

And it's easy, sometimes, to look at yourself from a birds-eye kind of thing, look down on your roles at work and in your relationships and in your day-to-day interactions with strangers and tellers and grocery store clerks and whatnot, and you can start seeing these roles you play. The hard-at-work don't bother me role. The I'm much more serious about life than you are and you mean very little to me role. The hardy adventurer come-what-may role. The sticks-to-his-guns idealist that has these MORALS to live up to role. The pretentious health nut who can't believe the garbage you're shoveling into your maw role. The smiling, mischievously happy about something but you'll never know what because you're just taking payment for his groceries role.

And then, maybe, the observing himself observe his many roles role. Ha ha, but there it's not really useful, as if it was to begin with, to realize you change through these roles like a frauffed up hussy careening through a slew of outfits before a first date.

But the useful part is this -- that I realize, now, that when I wake up in a dream, become really aware, the most useful reaction is not immediately to be all: WHO ARE YOU!? WHAT IS THIS ROLE I'M PLAYING?

Well, maybe it's kind of useful, sure, but no more useful than asking the SAME questions in waking life. Which, come to think of it, is actually kind of useful, at least the roles bit. But what else is useful? In terms of observing? In terms of better comprehending things as they really are? Real life and dreams alike?

How the hell should I know, really.

But here's a thought: Maybe trying to understand the nature of things without interfering. Because interfering changes their nature and then you can't pin down a god-dammed thing. Asking people about who they are and what role they're playing puts them on the defense and then they're obstinate in their little fantasy drama, and all your answers are coming from that mask they've slipped on. So maybe real observing is about realizing you're playing a role and so is everyone else, but being totally okay with that, and trying to look beyond it -- or around it -- into peoples' nature and the nature of things, natural and not so natural, that are all around you. And maybe, doing it all real passive and casual like, without letting on about any discomfort you feel realizing that we -- what we all do and how we all interact -- that it's all a bunch of put-on drama. Or maybe not even letting that discomfort eek in, because, candidly, that's just how we do.

So be okay with it. Play the role as much as looks, and feels, natural. But know it's a role. What you're doing and what they're doing alike, and maybe just take that into account when trying to comprehend peoples' motives and whatnot. When trying to get a better idea of how things are.